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I consider myself privileged to be a pastor of a congregation and in particular a pastor at the Kirk. Sometimes I get a lot of sympathy… "you are on call 24 hours"… "you can't please everyone-you have 1000 bosses"… We deal with a diversity of people with all sorts of theologies and dreams and visions for the church. Lots of opinions. Sometimes hurt feelings. And that is all true. But I'm here to tell you, that I consider it a privilege to be a pastor of a congregation and in particular the Kirk. Do you know why? Because I get a front row seat when it comes to seeing the love of Christ at work in the lives of people and in Christian community. I get a front row seat when it comes to seeing the love of Christ permeate through the lives of his active followers. I get to see Sandra Clark organize WIHN with love and passion and see her son Robert play ball with one of the kids who visit with us when the homeless come to stay for the week. I get to see her daughter Tiffany hold the baby of one of the stressed out mothers who is trying to raise a family on her own, trying to find a job, and who is without a home to live in. Her only home for the moment are the ones congregations provide through WIHN. The night I came to dinner I was grateful to see the Snows and the Millers bringing a meal and to see Rusty Parks and Karen Fleischhauer come to stay with them for the night. Over dinner I had a long conversation with Crystal-mother of three. She grew up going to church and is a Christian who tells me that she lost her way but is now living on faith after having tried to live life her own way. She is taking her kids to church. Do you ever think of the homeless who visit us as brothers and sisters in Christ? They are. Other homeless women joined the conversation and told me of their experiences in several congregations sponsoring WIHN. Most good but they told me of one where in that congregation they basically felt they were in lock down mode. In prison. The pastor would not smile or speak to them. He took his meal back to his office. If someone had to get up to use the bathroom, they were afraid that they would be called down for it. Try telling a 10 year old in the middle of the night that they cannot use the bathroom until breakfast. One woman said, "they don't even get to know us by name." That's why I like to visit WIHN and share a meal and drive the van… something very small compared to what I see church members do. I see Kirk members interact with our homeless brothers and sisters… loving them as Christ as loved us. I see Christian people and Christian community at it's best. I see us following the one of the last instructions of Jesus-- what he called a new commandment that Jesus gave his disciples just hours before he would die and leave them behind. I find it significant that these are last words from our Lord. When you know you are about to die or even just leave someone for a long time, you tend to say the most significant things-the most important things in your heart and mind. A mother or father leaves her child off in the church nursery or takes them to school for the first time. And you say, "Remember, I love you." If they are older, you might say, "Remember, how we taught you to behave!" or if they are going out on a date, "Be in by 11:00 p.m.!" My Mom meant that as a command when she said it to me! I've always loved the line used by the Desk Sergeant on old show Hill Street Blues. Remember what he would say to the cops on the beat just as he was to send them out into the streets? "Hey, hey, let's be careful out there." Jesus, knowing his time on earth was coming to a close, knowing
he was about to send them into the streets of their world, has some
important words for his disciples and thus for us: Do you know what is puzzling about those words? At first they don't sound that new to me. Those disciples had learned something like this in Levticus-"You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself" (Lev 19:18) Oh, it sounds the same, doesn't it? But did you see what was new about it. We aren't to love as we love ourselves… we are to love as Jesus loved us. And there can be a difference So often human love is the kind of love that will love as long as I get something out of it. In marriage counseling I often run across this. A couple will come to me and one or both will say in effect, "He or she is not meeting my needs… not loving me as I love myself!" It's a formula for relationship disaster. No one can love you enough to fill all your needs except our savior. I try to get them to see that it's not about getting your own needs met, it is about loving your spouse in a way that looks after their needs. It's about loving them sacrificially as Christ as loved us. You remember that passage in Ephesians where it says "Wives, be subject to your husbands as you are to the Lord. For the husband is head of the wife just as Christ is head of the church"? I've heard that quoted by a husband to Lord it over his wife so she will understand who is boss of the household. Occasionally I hear a wife quote it as a way to offer an excuse for her husband. But as my friend Rusty Parks would say, read what comes before and after that quote. Before the quote it says, "Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ." Did you hear that? "Be subject to one another…" Mutual subjection. Not lording it over one over another, but each one loving and caring for the other. After it there is a quote, "Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her…" In other words, husbands, love your wives as I have loved you… with the spirit of service, forgiveness, sacrifice and care. Truth is, Christ wants all of us to love one another that way… isn't that what he is saying in John? Not just husbands and wives… but church members - love one another as I have loved you… Next time you get mad with a fellow church member… and you are wondering how to respond, think about how you are going to love them as Jesus loved us when we let Jesus down. Don't think about how they should love you, think about how you should love them. Remember, the disciples were great disappointments and failures as they followed Jesus before he died. But he loved them….to the end. He didn't say, "well, they let me down… they are dilbert disciples-why should I die for them." No, he loved them-as he loves us. And the new command is that this is how Jesus says we should love one another. When we do this, then, he says, the world will know that we are people who love and follow him. They will know that we are disciples of Jesus. How did the old song say it that I learned in youth group, "They will know we are Christians… not by our words, not by our correct doctrines or policy decisions or even doing things decent and in order… They will know we are Christians not by the fact that we come to worship and attend Sunday School… or by the level of activity or growth in the congregation… but by our love… or should we say, by his love shared through us. One of the things I love about serving the church is that in spite of our faults and our struggles with sinfulness and selfishness, I get a front row seat when it comes to seeing this in action. My friend John, the minister at Palma Ceia saw this at one of his Session meetings. John has an elder who is on the last year serving on the Session and he is losing his memory. He is 83 years old. At a recent meeting the Session was having a second hearing on buying a house in their neighborhood to be used for transitional housing for unwed mothers. The elder spoke up and said (in a sort of Imus moment) "I've been thinking about this… if we put black people in those houses it wouldn't be fair to our neighbors. We shouldn't do this to our neighbors." John says, the Session was just stunned to hear this from the mouth of this elder. Their youth director, Alison, who is African American, got up from her seat, went over to the elder, sat next to him and put her arm around his shoulder and said, "Mr. So and so"-"I'm black and I live in the neighborhood and the neighbors have not been upset about that…" And he said, "Oh…" And the motion passed. You know what? She, in an Al Sharpton kind of way, could have nuked him…but she recognized that he had lost it… it was a loving thing to do for him… the kind of love Christ commanded. When John debriefed it with Alison she said she realized that he had three grandsons in the youth group and they would have been horrified to hear this… his son would have been horrified… and she said, when he made his comment, "I realized it was a voice from the past that had lost it's contex." Oh, what a Christlike love Alison shared. The kind of graceful love that healed and diffused a potentially explosive situation for the Session. The kind of love we've seen in Christ. By the way, John saw the elder the next day and the elder said, "I shouldn't have said that… and I'm sorry. I chose my words poorly. I've had a hard time with my memory and I shouldn't have said that. I shouldn't serve on the session anymore." Do you know what my friend John was able to see from his front row seat? Disciples of Jesus Christ, following his command- to love one another as Christ as loved them. Showing once again, that they are indeed people who follow our Lord. Amen.
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